Yeah what the heck, let’s watch the tremendous regional no-hitter once more.
That is Kumar Rocker at his peak: A 19-strikeout no-hitter within the NCAA Event. (Additionally: Hey, look, it’s Joey Loperfido!) Watching that video, you’d get the notion that he ran as much as the mound that evening in Nashville and obtained the Duke lineup to swing at each single 59-foot slider he threw. You wouldn’t be too far off. Peak Rocker was one in all my favourite faculty gamers ever, as a result of he had every part you’d need from an athlete. He was massive, he was bodily, he was expert. To observe him was to look at an excitable teenager (which he was) function the physique of a significant league ace (which he had).
Pitchers like him come alongside solely so usually, guys who not solely mow down faculty hitters however do it in a style that makes you marvel how even professionals will ever cope. Stephen Strasburg, Gerrit Cole, Carlos Rodón, Paul Skenes, and Rocker.
The straight line to the majors ended up not being so straight. There was COVID, and the emergence of Jack Leiter as the higher Vanderbilt pitching prospect, and considerations about Rocker stagnating. In any case, this was a child who by no means ought to’ve made it to varsity within the first place, who kind of solved the sport as freshman, successful a nationwide championship and being named most excellent participant of the School World Collection alongside the way in which.
Then Rocker obtained Brady Aiken’d by the Mets, spent a 12 months within the wilderness of impartial ball, then obtained drafted within the first spherical once more, this time by the Rangers. The final time I noticed Rocker pitch was in March 2023. I occurred to be in Arizona for the World Baseball Basic, and tagged together with Eric Longenhagen to look at Jacob deGrom and Nathan Eovaldi make simultaneous minor league rehab begins on adjoining again fields on the Rangers’ facility in Shock.
Rocker was beginning one more minor league spring coaching sport, and the slider regarded superior. It bit and dove and tempted and deceived A-ball hitters, lots of whom had been frankly inferior to the competitors Rocker had dominated in faculty. However that was the top of the excellent news. Rocker was solely throwing within the low 90s, and will find neither his fastball nor his slider. He regarded damaged. Two months later, Rocker went in for Tommy John surgical procedure.
It’s straightforward to overlook that annoying element about can’t-miss prospects: They miss on a regular basis. I began to fret that possibly Rocker would go down as a legendary faculty performer whose skilled profession was undone as a result of it began three years later than it ought to have.
To not fear. Rocker is making his main league debut tonight in opposition to the Mariners.
It’s slightly belated — Rocker is nearly 25 now — although the Rangers didn’t have him waste a single pitch greater than needed within the minors. Since coming back from Tommy John, Rocker has made simply seven begins throughout Double- and Triple-A, totaling 29 2/3 innings. In that point, he’s allowed simply 13 hits, three earned runs, and 4 walks whereas placing out 47.
Rocker’s two Triple-A begins obtained tracked and entered into the Baseball Savant database, and the outcomes are illuminating. His four-seamer averages 98.1 mph and performs as much as a most velocity of 99.9 mph. He’s additionally throwing a high-90s sinker and a low-90s changeup, each of which characteristic roughly 15 inches of arm-side motion. This spotlight reel of Rocker’s first Triple-A begin contains an audacious right-on-right changeup for a swinging strike.
That leaves the slider. It’s the pitch Rocker threw probably the most over these two outings, making up 55 of the 132 pitches he threw.
Now, a pair weeks in the past, I used to be fairly unkind to the slider as a category of pitch. After evaluating different secondary choices to specific, mature artwork implements, I stated the slider was like a crayon.
Seems some artists can do lots with a field of crayons.
In these Triple-A begins, Rocker threw 55 sliders, as I stated, and opponents swung 31 occasions. Eighteen of these 31 pitches had been exterior the strike zone, and 23 of these 31 swings led to a whiff.
I don’t actually know contextualize a 74.2% whiff price, even in a two-start pattern. Right here’s the perfect I can do. The highest whiff price on any pitch in baseball this season, minimal 100 pitches, is Mark Leiter Jr.’s splitter, which generates a swing and miss 58.6% of the time. (Rocker really can’t escape the Leiter household, even in random statistical comparisons.)
Clearly, a splitter is just not a slider, and Triple-A is just not the majors, however pitches with excessive whiff charges are usually chase pitches — both the hitter swings and misses or lays off the pitch for a ball. Simply taking a look at whether or not the pitch leads to a strike, both by hitting the zone or producing a whiff, Rocker is forward of the perfect swing-and-miss pitch within the league.
The Nastiest Pitch Leads to Baseball
| Outcome | Ball* | Strike | Foul | Hit | Discipline Out** |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rocker Slider vs. Triple-A | 30.9% | 54.5% | 9.1% | 1.8% | 3.6% |
| Leiter Splitter vs. Majors | 43.3% | 34.3% | 12.8% | 2.2% | 7.4% |
SOURCE: Baseball Savant
*Contains one HBP for Leiter
**Contains one ROE for Leiter
It’s mainly unheard-of for a single pitch to generate a called-strike-plus-whiff price over 50%. Something over 40% is elite. In keeping with Baseball Savant, solely 5 pitches have been thrown 50 or extra occasions in Triple-A this season and generated a CSW% of fifty% or increased. One among them is Rocker’s slider. One of many others is Blake Snell’s curveball.
I’m making an attempt very, very onerous to not get again out over my skis with Rocker. There’s mainly zero monitor file of minor league success for him, and no matter his presents could also be, massive league hitters are stronger, faster, and smarter than something Rocker has confronted earlier than. I don’t know if he can maintain the trouble to throw the way in which he does for 90 pitches a sport, as soon as each 5 days. He’s had bother protecting his mechanics collectively — quite a lot of the issues he confronted each at Vanderbilt and early in his skilled profession needed to do with letting his launch level drop.
None of that is sufficient to dampen the joy over what’s occurring now. Rocker is making his main league debut, coming off the heels of a white-hot run by means of the higher minors, wherein he was pumping upper-90s gasoline and throwing an unhittable breaking ball. That is an occasion I considered as a digital certainty from about April 2019 to June 2021, and had more and more despaired of ever attending to witness within the three years that adopted. You don’t need to miss it now that it’s occurring for actual.